Edwin Hawley Hewitt

Edwin Hawley Hewitt (March 26, 1874 - August 11, 1939)^[1] was an American architect from Minnesota. In 1906, he designed the Edwin H. Hewitt House in the Stevens Square neighborhood of Minneapolis, listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978.^[2]

He was born in Red Wing, Minnesota. After a partial course at Hobart College he entered the University of Minnesota in the sophomore class in 1893, graduating with the degree of A.B. in 1896. He then went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he studied during the winter of 1896-1897. The next three years were spent in the offices of Shepley, Rutan and Coolidge, Wheelwright & Haven, and others. He was married in 1900 and went at once to Paris, where he entered the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in May, 1901 where he became a member of the Atelier Pascal. In October, 1904, he returned to the United States, but he had completed his work at the Ecole. Arriving in Minneapolis, he was almost immediately offered a commission and at once started in on private practice, not having an opportunity to return to Paris for over eight years. As time went on he realized the importance in architectural work of the allied science of engineering in all its branches, and in September, 1910, he formed a partnership with Edwin Brown under the name of Hewitt & Brown, architects and engineers. Hewitt was instrumental in the work which culminated in the completion of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. He was president of the Minnesota State Art Society. He became a member of the American Institute of Architects in 1913, and was president of the Minnesota Chapter of the American Institute of Architects.^[3] The practice of Hewitt and Brown continued until Brown's death in 1930. Hewitt resumed private practice, but as business declined during the Great Depression, he closed his office and became the chief architectural supervisor for the Federal Housing Administration for the Minneapolis area. He died on August 11, 1939.^[4]

Buildings designed by Hewitt and Brown

• Metropolitan Bank Building, 2nd Ave. S. and 6th St.
• McKnight Building, 5th St. and 2nd Ave. S.
• Charles Sexton Residence, 2321 Blaisdell Ave.
• Architects and Engineers Building (1922) (NRHP)
• Qwest Building (1932)
• Eugene J. Carpenter House (1906) (NRHP)
• George Christian House, now the Hennepin History Museum, in the Washburn-Fair Oaks Mansion District^[5]
• Hennepin Avenue United Methodist Church (1916)
• Julia Morrison Memorial Building (Minneapolis School of Art), 25th St. & Stevens Ave. S. (1916) (now part of Minneapolis College of Art and Design)
• St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral (Minneapolis, Minnesota) (1908–11)
• University Baptist Church, 1219 University Ave. SE
• Northwestern National Life Insurance Company Home Office, Oak Grove and 15th. St. (now 430 Oak Grove Apartments)
• Dunwoody College of Technology, Wayzata Blvd. and Lyndale Ave.
• The Blake School, 110 S. Blake Rd., Hopkins, Minnesota
• Northrop School, 511 Kenwood Parkway, Minneapolis
• Citizens Aid Building, 404 S. 8th St. (formerly the George H. Christian Home)
• Charles S. Pillsbury residence, 100 E. 22nd St.
• Walter G. Hudson residence, 2400 Pillsbury Ave. S.
• Robert Webb residence, 1920 Pillsbury Ave. S.
• J. L. Record residence, 343 Oak Grove

References

This article incorporates text from Urban America's "Architectural forum: the magazine of building" (1915), now in the public domain.